Criss Angel collaborated with Cirque du Soleil to create Criss Angel Believe, a live show at the Luxor hotel in Las Vegas, which stars Angel, who is billed as "co-writer, illusions creator and designer, original concept creator and star."[2]

Angel originally tried to develop the show for a Broadway run, as well as other casinos. Eventually, what became Believe came together when he entered a partnership with Cirque du Soleil and the Luxor's parent company, MGM Mirage Resorts, financed the show with $100 million.[2]

After several delays, the show was set for a Gala opening on October 31, 2008, with preview shows in late September.[3][4][5] The initial preview was not well received, with thoroughly negative audience reactions.[6][7] The show opened to equally harsh reviews which cited a lack of the magic Angel is known for, as well as a confusing and uninteresting theme. Reviewers felt neither Angel nor Cirque du Soleil were able to perform to their capabilities.[8][9][10][11]

In April 2009, Angel ended a performance of Believe by "hurling obscene insults" at Perez Hilton, who was an audience member. Hilton reportedly had Tweeted to his fans during the performance that the show was "unbelievably BAD" and that he'd "rather be getting a root canal", and word had gotten back to Angel by the end of the performance. [12][13] Cirque du Soleil later apologized to Hilton for Angel's remarks [14]

Starting in October 2007 he appeared as a judge on Phenomenon, with Uri Geller and in a CNN interview about the show he told Larry King "no one has the ability, that I'm aware of, to do anything supernatural, psychic, talk to the dead. And that was what I said I was going to do with Phenomenon. If somebody goes on that show and claims to have supernatural psychic ability, I'm going to bust [him] live and on television."[15]

On the October 31, 2007 episode of the reality show Phenomenon, Paranormalist Jim Callahan performed a summoning, purportedly of author Raymond Hill, to help discover the contents of a locked box.[16] Although fellow judge Uri Geller praised the performance, Angel called it "comical" and subsequently challenged both Callahan and Geller to guess the contents of two envelopes he pulled out of his pocket, offering a million dollars of his own money to whoever could do so. This led to an argument between Callahan and Angel, during which Callahan walked toward Angel and called him an "ideological bigot", with the two pulled apart as the show promptly went to a commercial break. Angel has since revealed the contents of one envelope and at the unveiling he challenged Geller one more time. Geller was unsuccessful, and the envelope was revealed to contain an index card with the numbers "911" printed on it for September 11, 2001. Criss' explanation was this: "If on 9-10 somebody could have predicted that 9-11 was going to happen, they could have saved thousands of lives". The other envelope's contents was scheduled to be revealed on the first episode of Season 4 of Criss Angel: Mindfreak. However, the contents of the other envelope were never revealed and remain a mystery to this day.

Although Angel was seen with his wife in the buried alive illusion (season 1, episode 6, 2005), she was not credited as his wife. Rather she was listed as "Criss' Girl". During the divorce proceedings the attorney of Angel's estranged wife, Joanne Sarantakos, claimed that their relationship was kept secret to further Angel's career.[17]

Criss Angel appears in the Robot Chicken episode "I Love Her" voiced by Seth Green. When Severus Snape suffers a "minor potion accident," Albus Dumbledore hires Criss Angel to cover for his class. When Hermione Granger asks if they will be going over yesterday's homework, Criss Angel lifts her book as one of his "Mindfreaks." After doing a levitation trick, Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, and Hermoine stated that Criss used a wire which Criss dismisses. On a field trip, he uses a fake unicorn until a real unicorn appeared. When Criss Angel got near it, it impaled him with its horn as the students leave. It turns out to be another mindfreak as Criss Angel emerges from the unicorn costume.

Criss Angel was featured in the American Dad! episode "Delorean Story-An." It is revealed that he is Roger's favorite stunt magician.